1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system that includes an information processing apparatus, such as a personal computer or the like, and an output apparatus, such as a printer or the like, and to a printing management method or an authentication method executed in the system.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventional printing systems utilize a technique called department management in which an ID is provided for each department that uses a printer, a user is authenticated using the ID, and it is allowed, for example, to count the number of obtained printed copies for each department. In a first stage, only numerals have been used for an ID used in the above-described department management, for example, because of limitations in user interfaces. However, this approach is not widely used because its identification capability is inferior and the users cannot easily memorize the numerals. Recently, as a result of technical improvements, it is possible to utilize characters other than numerals, such as alphabet letters, or the like, for an ID by performing a function expansion using a card reader or the like.
Conventionally, if there arises a difference between functions depending on the presence/absence of a function expansion, it is necessary to exactly know whether or not the concerned printer is able to perform a function expansion, and perform a setting corresponding to the current situation before starting printing. If such processing is not performed, expected results cannot be obtained. Particularly, in authentication processing utilizing a department management technique, authentication is prohibited, and printing cannot be performed, thereby causing more problems than in other cases.